I finally agreed to meet with Hattie again. I couldn’t be mad at her forever. She’d only been speaking her mind, which was what I’d always loved about her. We met up for brunch the following Sunday morning at the Rose Street Market.
‘How are things going with Tess?’
‘Perfect, amazing! It just keeps getting better and better. She picked me up after work on Friday night, and she had organised a surprise special night for us — drinks at Double Happiness, dinner at the Toff in Town, jazz at Bennetts Lane. We went back to her place and I haven’t even been home yet. And you know the best thing about being with a woman? I can borrow her clothes!’ She held up her hands so that I could admire her outfit. ‘She’s my size. Can you believe it? We completely fit each other.’
‘You’re absolutely glowing. It’s so nice to see you like this. You deserve it.’ I pushed some mushrooms around on my plate and took a sip of my long black coffee.
‘How are things with you?’
I shrugged. I really, really didn’t want to get into any of my stuff. I felt self-conscious about my messy, complex life in contrast to Hattie’s perfect, beautiful, romantic new love where even clothes could be interchanged easily.
‘Same old,’ I said, nonchalantly.
‘What’s happening?’
‘Oh, I got the first pages of Parricide back from the designer. I sent it on to Suzi, the author, to check and guess what? She comes back with pages and pages of new manuscript. Whole new slabs of text. This is her fourth book and she still has no respect for the process. I’m tearing my hair out!’ It was hard being freelance sometimes. I missed being in-house, where at least I’d have colleagues to vent to and bond with over our mutual frustrations.
‘Did you tell the publisher?’
‘Yeah, I did tell him, but I’m not expecting much. He thinks the sun shines out of her ass. The longer I keep freelancing, the more I try not to get stressed out by it. If they can’t manage the author properly, then they can pay for all the extra rounds of corrections and all my extra work. Fuck it.’
‘Hear, hear!’ said Hattie. ‘How’s Luke?’
‘He’s growing a beard.’
‘No! What made him do that?’
‘Suzi. We had her over for dinner the other night. She told him she fancies a thick brown beard.’
‘Seriously?’
‘Seriously. Look around. See that waiter over there? How can you not find it attractive?’
‘No, I’m not talking about the beards. I mean Suzi and Luke.’
‘Oh.’ And although I’d sworn that I wasn’t going to tell Hattie anything, I couldn’t help myself. ‘You should have seen the two of them. They’ve certainly hit it off. My plan is working. It was so cute, like watching them on a first date.’
‘You’re crazy.’
‘I know. And she visited him at the Patch the other week. He’s been walking on air ever since. He’s much more pleasant to be around.’
‘Doesn’t it make you feel weird?’
‘Not really. It feels like a relief.’
‘So, what happens now?’
‘I sit back and watch while she takes him off my hands, hopefully.’
‘Do you like her?’
‘Look, I do. There are things that annoy me about her, like the book and her author corrections. But her son is nine and he’s a very well-adjusted kid. She’s done a good job raising him. And she seems to have a nice nature. She’s not too bossy; she can have a laugh. I think she’ll be all right for Max.’
‘That’s full on,’ Hattie said. ‘Are you really sure about all this? It’s a big thing you’re doing here.’
I felt my back tense up. ‘I know it’s a big deal. But I’ve thought about all of it. I can’t stop thinking about it. It’s the only way it can be. Going along like I have is unsustainable.’ Then I changed the topic, because I couldn’t stand any further questioning on the matter. I had to have strength in my resolve. I was able to rationalise everything in my head. In fact, in my head it all sounded perfectly sensible and reasonable. It just sounded a bit odd when I spoke it out loud.